Sunday, November 06, 2011

So Kenneth Arnold was a sober, sensible man, right?

18 Comments:

Flying Saucer Club sounds like a clip from a never produced Leave It To Beaver episode."Oh gee mom, why can't I join the Flying saucer Club..?"Talk to your father.."Dad walks in wearing his sweater, smoking a pipe..""Gosh Dad, I want to join..""Well Beaver, this is not a science..it's a ..its a...( hesitates while reading the ad)June notices the hesitation, "Well Ward, answer your son.." He smoothly answers in a monotone.."It's a communist plot to shake our confidence, son.." Eddie Haskell sarcastically pipes in "Yeah I saw one yesterday flying over the hobby shop!"Ward grimaces..while June smirks.Ward tries to compromise.."Flying Saucer Hobby Club, eh..why don't you wait a few decades and join a real scientific venture..like MUFON."Eddie Haskell laughs. Yeah right..""Shut up Eddie"

Very interesting document for someone interrested by the Genesis of the flying Saucers (myth). I have been always interrested by the links between Arnold and Ray Palmer, I consider an important variable regarding the genesis, the swith of meaning of the term and the popularization of the Flying Saucers. Well, it is not a place for a thesis ^^

May I ask when is dated this historiographical document or when it have been released, please?

I don't see this as detracting much one way or the other from Arnold's sense or sobriety - although any perceived classiness would take a hit. Seems like fairly typical hucksterism to me. He probably didn't even write the copy.

Arnold was a salesman before all this. I don't have any problems with someone trying to make a buck and everything was silly in the 50s. It wouldn't bother me if he tried to sell Alien Davy Crockett hats or ET hula hoops. Objective observers likely haven't looked closely at Arnold's actual account and how it checks out in every respect, especially his losing sight of the UFOs behind subpeaks that were located between Mt. Rainier and Mt. Adams. It's an extraordinary detail and it checks out. He either witnessed something otherworldly or he was lying.

You might be right about that Richie. I know he got publicly involved and pretty active after this incident. Frankly, what happened at Maury Island would have put me off the whole subject, but Arnold kept going. Whatever happened with Arnold after or even before, I think on that particular day, he was a good witness. Sort of the same way I feel about Lonnie Zamora.

I think the whole thing with Arnold has to be placed within the context of the time. Frankly, I look at it and it seems pretty much standard fare for the way people advertised things back then.

You've often been critical of UFO witnesses and experiencers by saying that despite the enormity of what they supposedly saw, their mundane lives went on much as before, with no discernible change. If anything, Arnold is an exception to this "rule". If Saul of Tarsus was around in the 1940s and had met Jesus on the road to Peoria, I think it's quite likely he would have done pretty much what Arnold did. ;-)